It's bewildering the way one thought connects to another, memories, sentences, pictures all strung together leading on to another. There's commonality in each one which is the pathway to the next, but where does the commonality come from and why are they so linked?
With one breathe I'm singing lullabies to my two year old daughter as she lingers between wake and sleep; with the next breathe my voice cracks with the weight of unexpected emotion as a memory submerges from the dark waters where grief swims and healing splashes. I saw a nightlight. An owl nightlight. The same nightlight I've seen nearly every night for the last two years. It's shades of pink, red, and orange. The "feathers" are open and lit by the tiny bulb from inside. The owl's eyes faintly glow from the rays beneath it. It remains on morning, noon, and night, but only at night does it ever get noticed.
An owl nightlight. My mom purchased the nightlight for Emma while she was still in the womb.
My parents visited while Logan was in the womb too. They were here when we found out his sex...it's a boy!
Logan.
My mom came down when I was in the hospital on bed rest. A surprise. My mother knew I "needed" her before I even knew it.
My mom was called back the hospital when I was rushed to an emergency c-section.
My mother was there when I woke, my womb empty, my baby in another room, my head light from the medicine that put me under, my body sore and nearly lifeless from the pain I endured before my head got fuzzy and sleep took me over.
My mother was there every night of every moment that Logan spent in the NICU.
My mother was there when I came home from the hospital that day. Empty womb, empty arms, and a broken heart. Bewildered. Confused. Full of doubt. Numb. Until...my mother curled up next to me in my bed, wrapping her arms around me, silently asking if I was "ok" and saying "I'm sorry"...for the pain. The floods came. I wept. I was baby-less and my mother was there to hold me.
And so the sequence of my memories came and went. Voice cracking, tears flooding my eyes, still singing to my rainbow baby girl as her eyes got droopy.
It was real. It happened. And the memories, so distance, seemed so vivid as if they were happening yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
I'm so thankful those memories are of distant times. I miss my Logan dearly, but I know now that going back to those painful, unbearable moments will not make me closer to him. I know that remember the pain does not make me love him more or less. The pain is real. It will always be real. I will always have random connections that link to memories and form a chain that sends me spiraling, splashing among my healing, drowning among the grief, treading water, but head still high, breathing in and out what little air I can find. The grief is as raw as it was back then, but the healing scabs the wound faster and relieves the pain for longer.
Some days I'm still a wandering baby-loss-parent, and other days I'm a conquering, overcoming, mother of two: one that soars, and one that walks.
And you know what....that's ok.
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